Aljamain Sterling Argues He Had ‘Most Dominant’ UFC 300 Fight, Despite Not-So-Fun Appearance
Sterling completely shut out Calvin Kattar in a classic striker vs. grappler matchup.
Aljamain Sterling didn't exactly steal the show at UFC 300.
It was a successful move up a weight class for the former UFC Bantamweight Champion in his fight against Calvin Kattar. Across three rounds, Sterling showcased his wrestling and grappling prowess, taking down Kattar 8 times with 10:43 of control time.
RELATED: UFC 300: Aljamain Sterling Talks Fighter Fashion, Culture Kings Capsule, & More (Exclusive)
The featherweights were met with much backlash from the crowd with boos echoing throughout the T-Mobile Arena. Sterling did turn up the volume in round 3 with a beautiful slam and follow-up punches on Kattar, but it wasn't enough to get the finish nor silence the critics completely.
Going the distance, all three judges scored the fight a lopsided 30-27 for Sterling. The fight may not have lived up to the UFC 300 hype, but Sterling reckons he might've had the 'most dominant' performance out of any fighter in the star-studded line-up.
"Our fight on that particular night of UFC 300 was not the most entertaining, but it was the most dominant fight I think you could have possibly looked at from the entire card from top to bottom," Sterling said on his YouTube channel.
"I think I'm arguably the top 3 most dominant on that entire fight card. So when you look at that, I think to keep it in perspective is you got a guy who's on average, lands, I think, about 4 or 5 strikes per minute, like significant strikes, who was reduced to about 0.5 or something like that over 15 minutes."
Calvin Kattar, a top-15 contender since 2019, has been dominated in the stand-up game once or twice before, but never has the "Boston Finisher" been overtaken on the ground... until now.
"A guy who went tooth and nail with [Max Holloway]," Sterling touted of Kattar. "A guy that went toe-to-toe with Giga Chikadze, arguably won against Josh Emmett, had a great performance against a guy who's knocking guys out left to right in Dan Ige, knocked out Shane Burgos, TKO'ed Andre Fili. Like, his resume of how dangerous he is goes on and on and on."
Not too happy at first with his performance inside the Octagon, Aljamain Sterling says he can hold his high after replaying the fight.
"Watched the fight back and I’m much happier with my performance," Sterling wrote on Instagram. "I worked with what I was given against a tall rangey sniper and dominated. Hopefully we can get some more power bombs in the next one!"
Stick with MMA Knockout for more daily coverage of the UFC and MMA.